The woman's scream was a fragile thing against the backdrop of the vast, open plains. It was a sound of pure terror, a final, desperate plea to a world that was not listening.
But Kaelus was.
From his throne deep within the earth, his scrying magic gave him a perfect, detached view of the unfolding horror. He watched as the goblins, their eyes alight with cruel glee, swarmed the overturned cart. They were like a pack of starving dogs, tearing at the canvas cover, their crude weapons hacking at the wood. The woman inside clutched her child, her face a mask of tear-streaked horror.
Ravi's mind raced, a frantic debate raging within the cold, calm shell of his avatar.
Do nothing. It's not your fight. You don't know the rules here. What if intervening attracts unwanted attention?
The pragmatic side of him, the gamer who had always calculated risk versus reward, screamed for inaction. This was a survival situation. His priority was himself and the Great Tomb of Nexus.
But another part of him, the part that was still just Ravi, the university student, was recoiling in disgust. He had fought countless digital monsters. He had 'killed' millions of them. But this was different. The fear on that woman's face, the blood soaking the back of the dead man… it wasn't rendered. It was real.
And then, a third, colder thought emerged, a thought born of the Sovereign Kaelus.
This is an opportunity.
An opportunity to test his power in this new reality. To see if his spells functioned the same way. An opportunity to gather live subjects for study. And most importantly, an opportunity to make a statement.
He had no intention of being a hero. But letting these… insects… run rampant so close to his domain was an insult. The area surrounding the Great Tomb of Nexus was his. Whether the world knew it yet or not.
His decision was made.
Back in the throne room, Gravity and Flora were still standing in chastised silence, while Rose had already turned to leave, her mind clearly on her new logistical duties.
"Halt," Kaelus's voice commanded.
Rose stopped instantly, turning back with a questioning, yet perfectly obedient expression.
His shadowed gaze fell upon Gravity. "You wished for an opportunity to serve."
Gravity's entire being lit up. The chance to redeem herself after his reprimand was a gift from the heavens. "Anything, my Lord. I will unmake mountains for you. I will drain the seas."
"Unnecessary," Kaelus stated, his tone flat. He raised a gauntleted finger, and a projection of his scrying spell shimmered into existence in the center of the hall. It was a perfect, three-dimensional image of the desperate scene on the plains: the goblin horde, the cowering woman and child, the dead driver.
Flora gasped, her sweet face twisting into a mask of disgust. "Filth. Such ugly, worthless creatures. They blight the landscape."
Boom, who had been standing as still as a statue, let out a low growl. "Permission to smash, Lord Kaelus?"
"No," Kaelus said, his voice cutting through their reactions. This first demonstration had to be his and his alone. "This is a simple matter. Gravity. Prepare a [Gate]."
Gravity's eyes widened slightly. A gate directly to a location he was only viewing through scrying magic? It was a feat of immense precision and power. It was a test.
"At once, my Lord," she said, her voice filled with a tremor of excitement. She raised a slender hand, and the space beside the throne began to warp. The air twisted and tore, folding in on itself not with a violent explosion, but with a silent, controlled implosion. A swirling vortex of deep purple and black energy, framed by a perfect circle of silver light, opened with a soft hum. It was stable. Perfect.
Kaelus rose from his throne.
The movement was seismic. For the first time since his arrival in this world, the Silent Sovereign stood to his full, towering height. His obsidian armor seemed to absorb the light of the chamber, and the aura of absolute power rolling off him intensified tenfold. The very air grew heavy, thick with a pressure that promised annihilation.
His loyal Guardians stared, their breath caught in their chests. Their God was going to walk upon the world.
Without a word, Kaelus strode towards the Gate. Each step was silent, yet it resonated in their souls like a drumbeat of impending doom. He passed through the shimmering portal, and in an instant, the overwhelming presence that defined the throne room vanished with him.
The world on the other side was a sensory shock. The gentle breeze, the scent of crushed grass, the warmth of the sun—it was all real, a stark contrast to the sterile, magically-controlled environment of the Tomb.
He had appeared twenty yards from the overturned cart. His sudden arrival was so silent, so utterly without fanfare, that the goblins didn't even notice him at first. Their attention was consumed by their prize. The goblin leader had just ripped the canvas cover away, revealing the terrified mother and child. It raised its bloodied axe, a leering, triumphant grin on its grotesque face.
And then, one of the smaller goblins at the back of the pack happened to turn. Its beady eyes fell upon the towering, shadowy figure standing motionless in the field.
The goblin froze. Its jaw went slack. The crude club it was holding slipped from its nerveless fingers and fell to the grass with a soft thud. It let out a choked, gurgling whimper, a sound of pure, instinctual terror.
That sound, the sound of absolute fear, was the only warning the others got. They turned, one by one, their jeers and snarls dying in their throats.
What they saw was not a man. It was an icon of death. A silent, obsidian titan whose face was a void of shifting shadows, from which two points of cold, silver light stared out, seeing everything, judging everything.
This was the effect of his most basic, always-active skill: [Aura of Dread: Tier 10]. It wasn't just a debuff; it was a projection of cosmic horror. It bypassed courage and willpower and injected pure, undiluted terror directly into the minds of his enemies.
The goblins began to scream.
They were not war cries. They were shrieks of madness. Some clawed at their own faces, their minds shattering under the sheer weight of the aura. Others dropped their weapons and tried to flee, but their legs wouldn't obey them, and they collapsed, convulsing in the grass. The goblin leader, the strongest of the pack, managed to hold onto a sliver of its sanity. It raised its axe, its arm trembling violently, and pointed at Kaelus, trying to form a challenge.
But all that came out was a wet, frothing sob. Its eyes rolled back into its head, and it fell to the ground, dead from pure fright.
The woman in the cart, who had been bracing for a brutal death, slowly opened her eyes. The horrific goblin faces were gone, replaced by the sight of their entire war party either dead or dying in seizures of terror, without a single blow having been struck.
And standing there, in the middle of the carnage, was him.
She couldn't process what she was seeing. Was he their god? A demon who had come to claim their souls? He was terrifying, an entity of shadow and cold light, but he hadn't moved towards her. He had simply… appeared. And the monsters had fallen.
Kaelus observed the effect of his aura with cold detachment. It works. Even more effectively than in the game, it seems. The minds of these creatures are fragile.
He had no interest in the groveling survivors. This was a test, and he needed more data. He raised a hand, his fingers outstretched.
[Tier 1 Spell: Magic Arrow.]
It was the most basic attack spell a level 1 mage could learn. In the game, it manifested as a small bolt of blue energy that did minimal damage.
But Kaelus was not level 1. His stats were maxed out, infinite.
A bolt of light shot from his fingertip. It was not small. It was a blindingly brilliant spear of pure white energy, the size of a ballista bolt. It didn't just fly; it tore through the air with a sound like ripping reality, leaving a shimmering trail of incandescent particles in its wake.
It struck one of the fleeing goblins.
There was no scream. There was no impact. The goblin, and the patch of ground it was standing on, simply ceased to exist. Vaporized. A perfect, five-foot-wide, glassy crater was left in its place, smoking slightly in the afternoon sun.
Kaelus paused, internally stunned. That… was a Tier 1 spell? The sheer, ludicrous disparity between his power and the laws of this world was more profound than he could have ever imagined.
He decided to try something else. A slightly higher tier.
He looked towards the distant, snow-capped mountains. A landmark. He raised his other hand.
[Tier 5 Spell: Lightning.]
The sky, which had been a brilliant, cloudless blue, was instantly blotted out. A swirling vortex of black and purple clouds materialized from nowhere, covering miles in a matter of seconds. The air crackled with an impossible amount of static electricity.
The woman in the cart could only stare in horror and awe as the world plunged into darkness.
Then, with a deafening, world-shattering CRACK, a single bolt of lightning descended from the heavens. It was not a thin, jagged line of electricity. It was a pillar of raw, celestial fury, as wide as a castle tower, glowing with an intensity that burned the eyes.
It did not strike the ground near him. It struck the peak of the tallest mountain on the horizon, miles away.
There was no sound of impact for several seconds. First, there was only the blinding flash of light. And then, a low, deep rumble started, a sound that was felt in the bones more than it was heard. The rumble grew into a ground-shaking roar as the entire top third of the mountain, a mass of rock and ice that weighed millions of tons, shattered and collapsed, starting an avalanche of apocalyptic proportions.
The sound of the distant mountain's death finally reached them, a shockwave of thunder that flattened the tall grass and buffeted the cart.
In the eerie silence that followed, Kaelus lowered his hand.
He now had his answer. His power was not just intact. It was absolute. In this world of sticks and stones, he was a walking, breathing nuclear arsenal.
His work here was done. He had his data. He had made a statement, even if only the mountains and a single terrified family were there to witness it.
He cast a final, indifferent glance at the woman and child, who were staring at him with a look of pure, primal worship, the kind one reserves for a wrathful god who has just spared them.
Then, he turned and stepped back into the swirling purple vortex of the [Gate], vanishing as silently as he had arrived, leaving behind a field of dead monsters, a smoking crater, a decapitated mountain, and two witnesses who would tell a tale that no one would ever believe.